The invention relates to an apparatus for -handling sheet-like articles, in particular an envelope-filling station for mail-processing machines.
In the case of Known mail-processing machines, there is provided an elongate conveying path which may be formed by circulating conveying chains provided with conveying fingers, it being the case that, in the region of the top strand of the conveying chains, the conveying fingers project up beyond the surface of the conveying path and form there enclosure compartments which move intermittently or continuously and into which processing stations or handling apparatuses, which are lined up along the conveying path, introduce enclosures or sets of enclosures, which then run into an envelope-filling station at the end of the conveying path.
The individual handling apparatuses may contain gripper mechanisms which draw off individual enclosures from enclosure stacks and introduce them cyclically into the enclosure compartments of the conveying path. It is also possible, however, for the handling apparatuses to be transfer apparatuses which are supplied with enclosures or sets of enclosures from feed apparatuses which run transversely with respect to said conveying path and open out onto the latter.
Known envelope-filling stations contain an actuating arrangement having a drive-lever arrangement, which can be pivoted back and forth by a drive mechanism and is mounted pivotably above a base plate located on the level of the surface of the conveying path, and having a carrier hand, which is articulated on said drive-lever arrangement and on which in turn there are pivotably mounted, as handling elements, push-in fingers which have their outer ends spring-prestressed toward the base plate and are actuated by a guide control means such that they have their outer ends lowered onto the base plate in an operating stroke and raised from the base plate in a return-stroke movement.
Envelope-filling machines of traditional design contain, as drive-lever arrangement, a comparatively elongate drive lever which is mounted pivotably on the framework at a relatively large distance above the base plate and is assigned, as drive mechanism, a cam plate which acts on a lever attachment, provided with a cam-plate follow-on roller, and which is set in rotation by a drive shaft which extends parallel to the conveying path. The rotation of the cam plate is coordinated with the conveying cycle of the conveying path, such that when a set of documents is conveyed onto the base plate of the envelope-filling station from the conveying path, the drive lever begins its operating stroke and the push-in fingers grip the document stack and push it, transversely with respect to the conveying direction of the conveying path, into an envelope which is held open, and only then does the next conveying cycle of the conveying path begin. The length of the drive lever of said known envelope-filling station design makes it possible for the handling, that is to say for the envelope-filling operation, to achieve a sufficiently high push-in speed of the push-in fingers, with the result that the push-in operation can be completed reliably within a conveying cycle of the conveying path.
If however, for the purpose of reducing the installation height of an envelope-filling station disclosed, for example, in WO 99/01295, use is made of an actuating arrangement for the push-in fingers which is in the form of a three-link mechanism, it being the case that on a carrier hand, which has the push-in fingers at its front end and can be moved backward and forward at a certain distance above the base plate, there are articulated a drive-lever arrangement and a further link, the two extending upward to the framework-side bearing points, and the drive-lever arrangement can be pivoted back and forth by a crank drive mechanism, this achieves the situation where, in certain phases of the operating stroke of the push-in fingers, the speed of the free ends of the latter over the base plate is not sufficient in order to be able to be coordinated with the operating speed of the conveying fingers of the conveying path or, in the case of intermittent operation of the conveying path, with the cycle of the conveying fingers.
The invention is intended to achieve the object of configuring an apparatus which is intended for handling sheet-like articles and has the features of the preamble of claim 1 such that the advancement speed of the handling elements of the apparatus can be coordinated over a wider range with the advancement speed of an arrangement for feeding the sheet-like articles to said apparatus.
This object is achieved according to the invention by the features specified in claim 1. An advantageous configuration is characterized in claim 2.